Chapter 24 - Page 2

women in France, - of the way they are always in
the ascendant; and here was a signal example of their
general utility. The young lady I have mentioned
conveyed her whole company to the wretched little
Hotel de France, where it is to be hoped that some
of them found a lodging. For myself, I was informed
that the place was crowded from cellar to attic, and
that its inmates were sleeping three or four in a room.
At Carcassonne I should have had a bad bed, but at
Narbonne, apparently, I was to have no bed at all. I
passed an hour or two of flat suspense, while fate
settled the question of whether I should go on to
Perpignan, return to Beziers, or still discover a modest
couch at Narbonne. I shall not have suffered in vain,
however, if my example serves to deter other travellers
from alighting unannounced at that city on a Wednes-
day evening. The retreat to Beziers, not attempted
in time, proved impossible, and I was assured that at
Perpignan, which I should not reach till midnight, the
affluence of wine-dealers was not less than at Nar-
bonne. I interviewed every hostess in the town, and
got no satisfaction but distracted shrugs. Finally, at
an advanced hour, one of the servants of the Hotel
de France, where I had attempted to dine, came to
me in triumph to proclaim that he had secured for
me a charming apartment in a _maison bourgeoise_. I
took possession of it gratefully, in spite of its having
an entrance like a stable, and being pervaded by an
odor compared with which that of a stable would
have been delicious. As I have mentioned, my land-
lord was a locksmith, and he had strange machines
which rumbled and whirred in the rooms below my
own. Nevertheless, I slept, and I dreamed of Car-
cassonne. It was better to do that than to dream of
the Hotel de France.

I was obliged to cultivate relations with the cuisine
of this establishment. Nothing could have been more
_meridional_; indeed, both the dirty little inn and Nar-
bonne at large seemed to me to have the infirmities
of the south, without its usual graces. Narrow, noisy,
shabby, belittered and encumbered, filled with clatter
and chatter, the Hotel de France would have been
described in perfection by Alphonse Daudet. For what
struck me above all in it was the note of the Midi,
as he has represented it, - the sound of universal talk.
The landlord sat at supper with sundry friends, in a
kind of glass cage, with a genial indifference to arriv-
ing guests; the waiters tumbled over the loose luggage
in the hall; the travellers who had been turned away
leaned gloomily against door-posts; and the landlady,
surrounded by confusion, unconscious of responsibility,
and animated only by the spirit of